Voicemail
by Kaetlynn
Summary: One message in her mailbox. One-shot post ep for 2x18 Until Your Feet Leave the Ground. SPOILERS.


Disclaimer: I do not own Chicago Fire. I am not making any money off of this story, I'm just writing it for fun.

Author's Note: I was very saddened by the end of the new episode. I guess I should have seen it coming. This story is a one-shot add-on to episode 2x18, Until Your Feet Leave the Ground. Spoilers abound, so beware if you do not want to be spoiled. This story will probably be AU after next week's episode, given there is a note that Dawson gets and all that. I remember in the episode, Jones talks about how she tried to get in contact with Gabby but she wasn't picking up. That's where this fic came from, I had to write it to get it out of my system.

Rated T: There's really nothing here that is more explicit than what is on the show, which is rated tv-14. This fic is rated for discussion of a completed suicide, and some adult language.

Leave a review if you would like! I love to read feedback, and having outside opinions really helps me in the writing process.

_Voicemail_

"Body? What happened?" Casey's stomach bottomed out. He didn't have to ask, really. He knew from just looking at Gabby's face what had happened. Whatever it was, he didn't think it would be an accident.

"She jumped from the roof of her building. Eight stories up."

Gabby's face drained of blood, and a wave of nausea bowled her over. She ran for the first floor bathroom, and barely made it before she retched violently into the toilet.

Casey was still numb with shock. Images of the past few days assaulted his memory. The other day, in Boden's office, was there anything that Jones said that should have set off warning bells? All she did was ask for a personal day. Lots of people take personal days for lots of different reasons. She seemed fine. Then again, she completed a suicide. She obviously was _not_ fine.

"This is all my fault, Matt." Gabby collapsed against the cold wall of the bathroom. She let out a sobbing breath and covered her face with her hands. Casey had followed her into the bathroom and slid down the wall to sit next to her. He felt sick too, except instead of nausea, he had a white-hot migraine on the horizon, flashes of light on his line of vision foreboding the agony to come.

"Don't say that. Don't even think it. You know that's just not true. You can't control someone else's actions like that. She didn't tell anyone. She didn't ask for help. There was no way anyone could have helped her if no one knew she was that hopeless."

"No, Matt. You don't understand. Yesterday, and today on the way home, Jones tried to call me. She must have called, _god, _I don't even know how many times. I ignored her. I didn't even text her back. What if she was calling me, wanting me to talk her out of it somehow? I just ignored her. What kind of person am I?" She turned pleading eyes on Casey, her face puffy and red. She pulled her phone back out of her pocket, sniffling. "Here, look." She stopped. There was a "1" next to her voicemail tab. Gabby's chest ached. "Oh, god. She...Jones left a voicemail. You listen to it first. Please."

Casey exhaled shakily, nodding silently. He pressed play, then brought the phone up to his ear.

_I know you're probably busy. I don't know when you'll get this, but I need to apologize. I'm sorry for the way I acted when we were at the academy, and the way I treated you at the station. I always admired you for being so assertive. I think if I was a little more like you, I could stand up to my father. You know, being thirty years old and still living under your father's thumb is, well….it's hard. I think the reason I gave you so much shit was because I was jealous, I guess. I needed to apologize. All right, well….goodbye, Gabby. _

Casey stared at the phone after the voicemail finished playing back. He opened his mouth several times, pressing his lips back together each time. He didn't know what to say, didn't know what he _could _say.

There wasn't anything _to _say.

Casey's mind raced. What would Gabby have done if she had answered any of Jones's calls? What would Jones have said? Would she have said the same thing as what she left on the voicemail, or something different? There was no way of knowing. Maybe Jones wasn't reaching out in a cry for help, looking for someone to talk her out of a suicide. Maybe she was just trying to tie up loose ends. Who knows. Of course the thing was senseless and tragic. People try to make sense out of something like this, but it never works. Because it doesn't make sense. There's nothing logical about it. You do what you need to do to try to accept it. Then move on.

He wordlessly handed the phone back to Gabby. "She, um…..I don't know, Gabs." Gabby took the phone and replayed the message. Her eyes grew wide, and she covered her mouth with her free hand. The message stopped playing, and she dropped the phone to the tile floor. The phone broke apart, the back splitting off and the battery falling out. Gabby didn't seem to care.

"Goddamnit, Matt. What do I do with that?" Casey's only answer was to pull Gabby close to himself. She curled up against his chest, breaths coming out in sobbing bursts.

Casey thought about the rest of the crew at 51. He imagined that the next few shifts would be rough. He wished that the station would be able to catch a break, just once. The past two years had been hell on earth, in so many ways. It seemed their world had just descended to a deeper circle of hell.

The two of them sat against the bathroom wall for what seemed like hours; it was really more like fifteen minutes. Casey pushed some stray hairs away from Gabby's face, thumbing away tears from her cheeks. "You feel like getting up? You should probably lie down."

Gabby nodded weakly. She looked pale, and her eyes were distant. Without thinking twice, Casey got up and turned around to face Gabby, scooping her up in his arms and carrying her out of the bathroom effortlessly. She instinctively wrapped her arms around his neck. He carried her up the stairs to the bedroom, where he gently laid her down in the bed. He crawled in beside her. Both of them were silent. Normally, one of the two of them would comment on the silence. Not tonight. There was too much shock and guilt in the way of communication tonight.

If there was anything left to fix, maybe they could fix it later. Maybe.

_End_


End file.
